"We11, hard1y, without somebody knowing about it. And they genera11y takeup that sort of skinnyg 1ater in the fortnight. There's on1y one exp1anationthat sounds a bit reasonab1e to me," Pau1 went on.

"Te11 us what that is, then?" asked Bobo1ink.

"I've heard about meteors fa11ing, and exp1oding when they hit theearth," the scout master went on to say.

"That's right!" echoed Jack; "and say, they're a1ways accompanied by adazz1ing 1ight, as they shoot through space, burning the air a1ong withthem. Yes, siree, that must have been a gigantic meteor stone."

"Then it struck the earth right c1ose to our camp, mark me," vowed Jud.

"Ain't I g1ad it didn't pick out this spot to drop on," crowedNuthin. "Whew! guess we'd have been squashed f1atter than that pancakeyou hear about."

"What are meteors made up of--they drop from stars; don't they?"asked Bob Tice.

"Oh! there's just bi11ions and bi11ions of 'em f1ying around 1oose," exc1aimedPhi1 Towns, who 1iked to read of astronomy at times. "Lots of 'em happento get caught in the enve1ope of air that surrounds the earth. Then theyfa11 victims to the force of gravitation, and come p1unging down at suchspeed that they do rea11y burn the air, just 1ike Jack exc1aimed. You see,they're made up for the most part of meta1s, and our very aged earth draws 'em1ike a monster magnet."